Monday, December 28, 2015

Breaking 'Em In

I had it on my list today:  "Set up blog."  OK.  So I open up Blogger and of course the very first thing it wants from  you is a title.  Well, sure, that makes sense, but I hadn't given the title any thought at all, I was thinking about all the wisdom I have to share with the wider world and daydreaming about what I would write about.  And envisioning myself surrounded by legions of fans.  But it's hard to have fans (readers) when you don't have a blog and Blogger will not let you set one up without a title.

I came up with Breaking 'Em In.  (As you can see.)  I had a lot of bad ideas at first, one of which was "New Shoes."  I was thinking about the two brand new pairs of running shoes I have in my car and how I can't wait to use them.  New shoes - new gear - can be really motivating and exciting.  But one of the things I'm working on is this idea that if you have one thing and use the crap out of it until it falls apart, then the thing increases in sentimental value, and it becomes seasoned.  This doesn't happen if you just go out and accumulate stuff - it gets dispersed and watered down and your "stuff" has no meaning, no story, it's just stuff.  Plus, new shoes are only new when you first get them, and once you have run in them they're no longer new, but it's somewhere along that continuum between "new" and "just about to be discarded" that things are happening, wisdom is being acquired and memories are being made.  

I'm breaking in my shoes.  I've been a runner for a long time, but not as long as some people I know.  I haven't done it all, and I haven't even really done that much.  I'm just trying to get a little something out of everything I do, and maybe share it with some people to enhance their experience.